514 Eifrig, Birds of the Chicago Area. [o"£ 



lovers and nature students, to which frequent trips, one may almost 

 say pilgrimages, are made by such varied organizations as the 

 Geographic Society of Chicago, the Ornithological Society, the 

 Prairie Club, the Friends of Our Native Landscape, and numerous 

 classes in geography, geology, botany, zoology and especially 

 ecology from the local universities and other institutions of learn- 

 ing. A part of this unique region is now proposed to be made into 

 a national park before it falls prey to the further encroachments of 

 steel mills, etc., as at Gary, and all members of the A. O. U. hav- 

 ing a chance to aid in advocating this plan should not fail to do so. 



Hydrochelidon nigra surinamensis. Black Tern. — The breeding 

 grounds of this species, the large cattail swamps, are being sadly encroached 

 upon by filling in and draining, and are replaced by large industrial plants 

 or by fields. This is notably true of two of their once greatest breeding 

 grounds in the country, the Calumet marshes, in the southern part of 

 Chicago, around Lake Calumet and Wolf and Hyde Lakes, and the other, 

 the famous Worth region, now drained by a large drainage canal. The 

 fields now started there, and the chemical works going up in their place, 

 with their pestilential effluvia and smoke, may be a necessity, but one 

 hates to see this change. Still, we have seen hundreds of these Terns on 

 Lake Calumet, September 4, 1915, and at Millers, Indiana, August 30, 1916, 

 where they were diving into the schools of minnows near the water's edge 

 of Lake Michigan, flying parallel with it, a few yards from shore. While 

 most of the adults are then in their winter plumage, several were seen in 

 the deep black nuptial dress. 



Sterna caspia. Caspian Tern. — This large Tern may be seen on 

 certain days during migration in large numbers over the lagoons in Jackson 

 and Lincoln Parks, and in the places named under the preceding species. 

 When there is a strong east wind, Lake Calumet, in the southern part of 

 the city, is alive with them, as well as with the Common, Forster's, and 

 Black Terns, and the Herring, Ring-billed, and Bonaparte's Gulls. This 

 also holds good for the south end of Lake Michigan. 



Sterna f orsteri. Forster's Tern. — 1 n the large Tern flocks along the 

 lake shore near Millers, this species often predominates in number. On the 

 wing it can be told from Sterna hirundo by its larger size and whiter, 

 more silvery appearance, especially on the lower parts. August 30, 1916, 

 we saw about 200 near Millers, Lake County, Indiana. 



Phalocrocorax auritus auritus. Double-crested Cormorant. — 

 This species, still breeding along the Illinois River, in the central part of the 

 state, is not common here. A female in my collection was shot here, on 

 the lake, October 16, 1917,. 



Mareca penelope. European Widgeon. — I have in my collection a 

 male bird of this species which I obtained from Mr. K. W. Kahmann, a 



